Archive for the ‘advice’ Category

While it’s natural to want to post a comment or two on the blog venting your frustration, I just want to make sure you all know that it’s not the best way to get your issues resolved. For one thing, I’m just one guy and I wear a LOT of other hats, so I might not see some of the comments for a while — especially over the next several days — and that’s time you could have been spending happily surfing porn, which is the real reason we’re all here after all.

So, just to be safe, I thought I’d provide some info/reminders on how to get the help that you need when your experience on the site is “not great”:

No help on the FAQ? Email our Customer Support team. The single best way to do this is by going to our Contact Us form at http://www.videobox.com/support/contact, because the form adds some information about your browser, your account, etc.

Emailing Customer Support this way makes it easy for support to look up your account and troubleshoot before they have to ask a single question.

When you send a message to Customer Support, please provide as much detail as possible about your problem. They absolutely love things like the link to the page you have a problem with, the exact name of a video that isn’t working, or painstakingly thorough lists of steps you took that resulted in your issue. Seriously, nothing is too much here if it makes things more clear.

Check your spam or junk folders for replies from Customer Support if you don’t hear back within 24 hours (up to 48 if you send a message on the weekend). If you received the auto-reply from our system when you submitted the form, that’s great, but it’s not a guarantee you will get the reply from support in your inbox.

Coming closely on the heels of news regarding the Heartbleed bug, the U.S. Homeland Security Department’s Computer Emergency Readiness Team is now saying to stop using Internet Explorer until Microsoft can fix a different flaw specific to that browser.

We just want to pass that along to you, both to protect your security and to enhance your browsing experience. For both Mac and Windows, we recommend using Google Chrome, but Firefox and Safari are also decent options. In any event, it sounds like your best bet is to stop using any version of IE.

Are you in a relationship? Do you wish you could share your VB membership with your significant other, but aren’t sure how to introduce it? Porn, by its nature, is a pretty charged subject. In a relationship, it can be a minefield – but it can also be a great way to bond with your partner and take your sexual relationship to a new level. In this post, I’ll give you a few pointers for avoiding the mines and maybe even discovering a new way to connect with your partner (who I’ll be referring to as a female from here, but the advice applies to any gender).

Why do you want your woman to watch porn with you in the first place? Hopefully it’s so that she’ll get really turned on and want to fuck you silly. So the key is to figure out what’ll turn her on. One way to find out is to ask, but I fully realize that that’s kind of direct and may not yield any useful information. Here are some guidelines that may help if she’s not 100% comfortable spelling out the kind of videos she wants to watch yet.

I may be a woman, but I’ve shoved my hands into enough fake vaginae (and read enough angry customer service emails and reviews at said fake vag purveyer) to know a lot more than a picture can convey to you about what these products are like. I also happen to know how to care for them so they don’t disintegrate or smell like burning tires, as well as some tips for purchasing better-quality products.

There are a few different types of pussy-like toys out there for men (commonly called “masturbators”) and knowing the difference between them can save you some time and money.

Plain Jelly Sleeves

These are the cheapest types of sleeve-style masturbators and are essentially a tube of squishy jelly-like material with a hole in the middle. Sometimes they are ribbed or have “ticklers” inside and come in a variety of shapes (pussies and flowers are most common – go figure).

There are a few issues with these toys to be aware of:
1. They often smell very strongly of plastic/chemicals when they come out of the box (and after you wash them).
2. The size of the toy makes a huge difference in how useful it is. Some are as small as 3″ and they really aren’t good for anything. If you make sure that the toy is as at least as big as your dick, you’ll be much happier.
3. The holes in these things are very small. For some, this provides a welcome amount of pressure; for others, it’s uncomfortable.
4. You should really only use water-based lubricants with these toys (Astroglide, Wet, ID, etc). Silicone and oil-based lubes can interact with these things and break down the material.
5. Keep these in a box or bag when you’re done with them. They can stain other items if they’re left in contact for a while.

I have a question for you.
I’m a 30 year old male and I’ve never ejaculated during intercourse or a blowjob. Maybe this is normal but I don’ t hear a lot of people complaining about it. I can fuck for as long as I want and sometimes I feel kind of close but I never make it that far. At best I can fuck a lot and then my girl friend has to jerk me off but even that’s hard. Could it be I’ve masturbated too much in life? I started when I was 13 and jerked it quite a lot between now and then but I doubt that is uncommon. There are lots of products out that to help a man stay hard or not to cum but is there anything out there to help a guy like me cum easier?

In a few months I’m going to be traveling through Europe (from America) on business, so I will be bringing my laptop with me (a Mac, if that makes a difference…).

My question is, should I be worried about the porno files stored on my hard drive or the “adult” bookmarks on my web browser as I go through various airports and customs? What is the policy about bringing porn in this fashion into the EU?

As far as I know (I would hope this goes without saying, but…) nothing in my computer would be constituted in America as illegal or obscene, though it’s possible that a few downloaded files–my beloved and oft-mentioned copies of Laure Sainclair movies, for instance–violate copyright laws (I really don’t know: I don’t show them to anyone else and I don’t profit from them, I just downloaded them from the web…).

How closely will airport (or railroad) security in these countries be checking my laptop? I’m not a terrorist, and I’m not bringing explosives or the like into their country, but I remember once traveling abroad with a porno magazine in my suitcase and I got a fairly thorough grilling about it from security at JFK airport. They let me travel, and they let me bring the magazine (I threw it away in the country I was visiting) but it was embarrassing and I wouldn’t want either to be held up or to hold up other passengers with a two-hour quiz on the content of my VB files!!

I’d like to introduce the first installment of what I’m very creatively calling Ask Alison. Thanks to everyone who sent in questions! I’ve included three in this post, but don’t worry if your question didn’t make it this time. It may appear in a future edition.What measures are taken to ensure hygiene and minimize the risk of infections in A2M scenes? As most people know, feces is a bearer of all kinds of pathogenic germs, even to the extent that entering a vagina with a penis that was previously a woman’s butt can destroy the vaginal flora. Taking such a penis into the mouth doesn’t make it much better, so what is done in porn productions to reduce the risk of infections through A2M or similar activity?

Yours, A.

Dear A.,

I’ve been a very vocal critic of ass-to-mouth (A2M) for years. It’s an unhygienic practice and I personally don’t find it attractive to watch. The bad news is that, for the most part, no precautions are taken on sets to specifically reduce the risk of infections through A2M. Before most anal scenes, the female performers use enemas or anal douches to clean their rectums so as to avoid unpleasant accidents on set. People claim that this makes the risk from sucking on a cock that was recently in someone’s ass much lower. I don’t personally buy it, but I’ve never heard of someone getting sick from it either, so I think the jury’s still out on this subject.

Since it sounds like fun, I decided to start an Ask Alison feature wherein readers can email me at alison@videoboxblog.com and I will respond to their questions in a post.

This is not my first attempt at this sort of thing, in case you’re concerned about my credentials. I wrote a sex advice column for about two years when I was working for a porn/sex toy retailer and had (what I considered at the time to be) an excess of knowledge about things like how to clean CyberSkin and how to convince one’s significant other to watch porn.

Since that time, my very specialized expertise has expanded to things like how pornstars get ready for an anal scene (hint: they don’t eat burritos) and how much they’re paid for it.

So, if you’ve got a burning question about sex, porn, dildos, relationships or related topics, email me! Be sure to include the name you’d like to be identified by in the blog.

I spent the last 4 days in Florida at the Internext Miami trade show. One of the most interesting meetings I attended was with the legendary actor/director John Stagliano. As it turns out, in addition to being the father of gonzo porn, he’s a really nice guy. I was showing him the VideoBox site and I figured he might be interested in your suggestions for porn directors.

He didn’t have time to read all the comments, but I think he got the gist. Since one of the major gripes about porn is that the women never finish the guys off, I asked John why he thought that was. His answer was interesting.

One of his theories is that so many guys in the industry use pills or injections to get an erection. Because they have a hard dick, they can perform, but an erection doesn’t ensure an orgasm. John thinks that they’re hard, but not turned on, so it’s really difficult to ejaculate. Hence the furious jerking off that takes all day.

The other theory John had was that guys in porn are trained to fuck for a long time and that mentality makes it hard to finally come. Additionally, with all of the distractions on a porn set – people standing around, director telling you what to do, etc. – it can be hard to concentrate.

Before we changed subjects, he said that when he was performing, he always tried to have the girl finish him off. He thought it was not only more pleasurable, but makes for hotter, more realistic porn. So I may have been preaching to the converted, but he seemed even more resolute in his belief that it was what fans want by the end of the conversation.

It was kind of serendipitous that I got to show your list to John Stagliano and I have no idea whether I’ll ever have a chance like that again. But he was really impressed by the passion and enthusiasm of VideoBox members and I just wanted you guys to know.